Unprecendented

I blogged 4 times in the month of March.   A thousand apologies,  as I know you are all sitting riveted in your seats wondering what marvelous things are going on in my life.

Let me bring you up to speed.

It's really really really cold and I'm so sick of it.

By not blogging in March I spared you endless bitching about the unnatural coldness.  You're welcome.

In all serious, I haven't been blogging because I have had a serious case of writers block - which surprised even me since I don't write anything on here that takes much thought.   I generally don't proofread before I hit post (and when I say "generally don't proofread" I mean "I never once have proofread").  But when your life is full of mundane and it's really cold out and you are about to lose your ever loving mind if you don't get out of your 881 SF of hell... it becomes hard to think about anything else.

I did miss posting about my Little Man's 1st Easter while I was wallowing in my own despair.  Here we go!!

 Happy Easter Little Man!!

 And another one.  Please ignore me... it was early and I hadn't had any coffee or food or makeup or... anything.  But I need to be IN the picture more often and I'm trying to not let things like looking like I'm a zombie get to me.    Actually I didn't wear any makeup at all on Easter since we were running around like mad people trying to get to Church on time.   We failed in that endeavor and I still had to go sans makeup!

 Stolen egg!  The Easter Bunny only left eggs for Baby Girl to find, but my Little Guy was more than happy to steal them from his big sister.

 His Easter Basket!  Filled with mostly food,  some socks and sippies.   Oh, and a truck because what little boy doesn't want a blue police car?  I think it's a paddy wagon... what little Irish kid doesn't want a toy paddy wagon??  (answer: all of them) 

 Hello.  I think deep thoughts.  Also, how adorbs is my Easter sweater vest? 

Big Sister's 3rd Egg Hunt of the season.   Lucky.  Little Brother is more than happy to steal these too.

Family!  Even though I picked out and dressed the children, I guess I didn't get the memo to wear blue.   I also hate this picture, but again... trying to get IN the picture more often.   It would help if I had more makeup on!

I'm going to try to post more in April.  I still have massive writer's block, but I'm going to make an effort to push through it.

fail

I really though I would get some pictures taken on this vacation.   The only time the camera came out of its bag was the day we went to the Vineyard for a few hours.    Here's the best of the group.

Baby Girl with a pouty face. This is actually a test picture to make sure my settings were right (and I eventually gave up and shot on the automatic setting). I don't know why she was sulking, but it made me laugh

Andrew and Baby Girl when we were waiting for the Queen to make her arrival.  Little Man was with us,  though there is no photographic evidence of that.

Gingerbread houses in OB.   Can someone explain to me why there is a blue tinge to these pictures?  My white balance was on sunny day...  I don't know what else to put it on when it's sunny outside.

Ye Olde Hotel on OB Harbor.   Not really, but I can't remember the name of it.  It's an old hotel though.  And it's right on OB Harbor. I stayed there a few years ago for one of my friend's 30th birthdays.  Quite fun.

Steamship Authority.  Nothing too exciting there.  We didn't take the Steamship.  It's expensive and takes forever.

Oak Bluffs Harbor.   Again with the lighting.   I don't know how to make my pictures better,  I just know they aren't very good!

Shadows

On Andrew's suggestion,  I tried Google + to edit my picture for February.   It will have to do since after April I can't use Picasa anymore,  but I'm not 100% thrilled with it. I fully admit Google runs my life (I use gmail,  Blogger even though I like Wordpress better,  Google Docs,  Picasa...)  I just don't like Google +.   I'm pretty sure Facebook is second when it comes to running my life and I'm fine with that.  I don't need Google + as well,  but now I have to use it.   And I can't put fun images on my picture,  like last month's super cool firecracker.    I really need to get Photoshop but since I have a next to useless computer that probably can't even run Photoshop,  I'm  not about to spend the money on it right now.   I have to buy it before my mother retires though, since she gets a teacher discount on it and she'll never need it for herself.

That also brings us to the actual picture.   I've already admitted I've been awful about taking non-iPhone pictures lately,  so I had nothing to use for February.  I did take my camera down the cape yesterday,  but I never got to the beach to take some winter scenes.   I went through that past year's winter photos but they were all very snowy.   Since it hasn't really snowed yet this winter and I would love to keep it that way,  I'm not about to jinx myself and end up with a blizzard. 

In the end I picked a picture from early April last year.   I like to remind myself that spring is coming!   Poor Baby Girl could not understand why we were down the cape, but NOT going to the beach to swim.   We kept driving by the beaches and at one point Baby Girl said  "is that the beach we are not going to?".    Poor kid.  I had to keep promising the next time we were down there we could play on the beach - which now means I can't go back to the cape until May-ish when it's at least warm enough to run around on the sand.    She certainly is my little beach baby!   She is so unlike me in many ways,  but we do share a love of the beach.   My perfect beach day involves margaritas and trashy novels though... I'm pretty sure hers includes me taking her swimming 8765 times and making sand castles all day. 

But for right now it's February and cold.   But the Patriots play in the Superbowl today!!! 

Let's go Patriots!!  Add another one! 

bonus

I was playing around with picnik and made this. Isn't she adorable? Ignore the red faux crocs that clash with her plaid shirt!

all about me!

I taught my girl a new song:

happy birthday to..... MAMA!
happy birthday to ..... MAMA!
happy birthday dear...... MAMA!
happy birthday to Mama!

It's our current favorite song. But Tim McGraw is better with words than we are:

I think I’ll take a moment, celebrate my age
The ending of an era and the turning of a page
Now it’s time to focus in on where I go from here
Lord have mercy on my next thirty years

Hey my next thirty years I’m gonna have some fun
Try to forget about all the crazy things I’ve done
Maybe now I’ve conquered all my adolescent fears
And I’ll do it better in my next thirty years

My next thirty years I’m gonna settle all the scores
Cry a little less, laugh a little more
Find a world of happiness without the hate and fear
Figure out just what I’m doing here In my next thirty years

Oh my next thirty years, I’m gonna watch my weight
Eat a few more salads and not stay up so late
Drink a little lemonade and not so many beers
Maybe I’ll remember my next thirty years

My next thirty years will be the best years of my life
Raise a little family and hang out with my wife
Spend precious moments with the ones that I hold dear
Make up for lost time here, in my next thirty years

In my next thirty years

Through the Years:

hmmm.... circa 1986 or 87 I think.

Fall, either 1994 or 1995. I'm leaning towards 1994


Our wedding, June 18 2006



My little family, April 2011

flashback

I cleared off the memory card of my little point and shoot camera, so my parents can take it with them on vacation. I found a bunch of pictures from right before BG's birth and when she was a teeny baby!

Here's my baby girl!

me and my baby. She has dark hair and I have blond hair. Somehow that got reversed in the past 21 months....

Baby Girl, about 2 days after we came home from the hospital!

hello! I'm a funny looking infant!

someone tell my mama that I'm not ready for pigtails! (also, give her the FYI on focusing the camera....)

These aren't right after she was born, I believe they are right before she turned 1. This was her first trip to the beach. She didn't really like it, but by the end of the summer she was a beach fanatatic! Also, I got a horrible burn on my back that day. It still hurts when I think about it.

Wordless Wednesday

It sucked and then I cried

Yes, blatant plagiarism from Dooce. But then I just admitted I took it from Dooce, and I'm not trying to pass it off as my own, so it's not plagiarism anymore, is it?

My baby is not a baby anymore. She's a toddler. She's a mini human who talks, walks, throws temper tantrums, tries her hardest to use utensils, and loves to show me all the babies in her books. Yes, she understands what a baby is. I'm pretty sure once you know what a baby is, you can't be labeled as one anymore.

I can't believe her precious babyhood is over. I did wish away her new born infant stage, and no, I still don't regret it. Those first 6ish weeks were hell. I cried every day for 2weeks. I was fighting some mild depression, trying to learn how to nurse my baby, dealing with my limited time at home with her, and keeping myself held together. It was hard. And I hated it.

But her babyhood? That was awesome. It was full of smiles and giggles and hugs and new milestones every week. And now it's gone, captured only in the almost 2000 pictures I have of it.

Yup. TWO THOUSAND PICTURES. Hi-res pictures no less.

And I wonder why my laptop is so slow....

Anyway, I don't have a baby anymore. Oh, I'll still call her a baby. She's not even 18 months yet, I know that she's still considered a baby in the eyes of the rest of the world. But I'm here to tell you, she's no baby.

updates

Baby Girl had her Christmas pictures taken on Saturday. My smiley happy baby decided to be a grumpalump for her pictures. Not a single smile. Why do babies do that?

We bought New Super Mario Brothers Wii. It's very fun. But very hard. I had to have a conversation with Andrew before we played it - reminding him not to get frustrated with me, because I am not good at these new fangled games. Yet he still did. Anyway, it's a fun game and we are enjoying it. Though we won't really dig our teeth into it until later tonight when the babe is asleep.

I am so so so so so so excited for a 3 day work week. This week is better than Christmas week. And I get to work from home on Wednesday. I LOVE THANKSGIVING!

seriously?

Tomorrow is October 1, so it's time for the picture to change. Because I am in denial that winter is coming, I'm putting up a summer photo. :)